Ballad of the Whiskey Robber: A True Story of Bank Heists, Ice Hockey, Transylvanian Pelt Smuggling, Moonlighting Detectives, and Broken Hearts [Paperback]

Julian Rubinstein (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 13, 2005

DESCRIPTION: Elmore Leonard meets Franz Kafka in the wild, improbably true story of the legendary outlaw of Budapest. Attila Ambrus was a gentleman thief, a sort of Cary Grant--if only Grant came from Transylvania, was a terrible professional hockey goalkeeper, and preferred women in leopard-skin hot pants. During the 1990s, while playing for the biggest hockey team in Budapest, Ambrus took up bank robbery to make ends meet. Arrayed against him was perhaps the most incompetent team of crime investigators the Eastern Bloc had ever seen: a robbery chief who had learned how to be a detective by watching dubbed Columbo episodes; a forensics man who wore top hat and tails on the job; and a driver so inept he was known only by a Hungarian word that translates to Mound of Ass-Head. BALLAD OF THE WHISKEY ROBBER is the completely bizarre and hysterical story of the crime spree that made a nobody into a somebody, and told a forlorn nation that sometimes the brightest stars come from the blackest holes. Like The Professor and the Madman and The Orchid Thief, Julian Rubinsteins bizarre crime story is so odd and so wicked that it is completely irresistible.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

This story of a bank robber who captured a nation's sympathy in post-Communist Hungary is a rollicking tale told with glee and flair. Attila Ambrus sneaked over the border from Romania into Hungary in the waning days of Communist rule. After talking his way onto a Hungarian hockey team, he turned to robbery to make some cash in the Wild West atmosphere of the early 1990s in Eastern Europe. As journalist Rubinstein shows, Ambrus was quite good at it. Taking advantage of poor police work, he took in millions in Hungarian currency and became a headline-grabber. He managed to stay at large for several years while continuing in his role as a back-up goalie on the ice. Rubinstein has a knack for telling a good story, and he captures well both Ambrus's appeal and the atmosphere of the first few years of capitalism in Hungary. Along the way, he introduces readers to memorable characters in addition to the appealing, alcoholic protagonist: the women Ambrus attracts and a Budapest detective driven out of office by the crime spree. While Rubinstein (whose work has been collected in Best American Crime Writing) overwrites at times, he has a rootin'-tootin' style that's a perfect fit for this Jesse James–like tale, which has the chance to be a sleeper that transcends nonfiction categories.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Bookmarks Magazine

Hungarians loved Attila Ambrus; from Rubinstein’s appealing biography, it’s easy to see why. Rubinstein tells the story of this goalie-gone-bad with style and wit. He also maintains a historian’s impartiality, however, supported by a wealth of meticulous research. One reviewer complained that Rubinstein glossed over the misery of life in 1990s Hungary, but this was his only criticism of an engaging and informative tale. Readers of Ballad of the Whiskey Robber may not fall in love with Attila Ambrus as the Hungarians did, but his story will surely entertain them.

Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Back Bay Books (September 13, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0316010731
• ISBN-13: 978-0316010733
• Product Dimensions: 5.5 x 1 x 8.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 11.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (55 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #484,983 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Hello.
I maintain a Facebook page for this book, where more information about it, as well as news about the film, and Attila Ambrus and his prison sentence, etc, is posted. Please feel free to visit me there.
www.facebook.com/whiskeyrobber

To follow me and my other work, you can visit my personal Facebook page.
www.facebook.com/julian.rubinstein1

or my website:
www.julianrubinstein.com

You can also follow me on Twitter:
@j_rubins

I appreciate your interest in my work and I do my best to respond to all email.

Sincerely,
-Julian Rubinstein

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Miracle of Nonfiction Reporting Turned into Novel Suspense, November 20, 2005

By 

M. JEFFREY MCMAHON "herculodge" (Torrance, CA USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Ballad of the Whiskey Robber: A True Story of Bank Heists, Ice Hockey, Transylvanian Pelt Smuggling, Moonlighting Detectives, and Broken Hearts (Paperback)

Julian Rubensten the author says in an interview he couldn't believe no other writers were jumping on this true story of a Hungarian hockey player "supplementing" his income by robbing banks in the early 1990s. Most reviewers have already summarized the plot. If I can only add some things: This is more than a page-turning comedy full of colorful criminals and real-life Keystone Cops. This is a tragedy about a man who, dismissed by his father and ridiculed by his teammates as a homeless peasant, wanted to be loved, to be accepted and to be a somebody and who used his talents, cunning, and imagination to become a grotesque criminal. Atilla, the main character, is so endearing, which attests to Rubenstein's great writing skills.

Lovers of comic novels such as Confederacy of Dunces, The Gingerman or any of the farcical novels of Thomas Berger and Magnus Mills should love Ballad of a Whiskey Robber.

18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Cops and Robbers of the Absurd, December 2, 2004

By 

R. Hardy "Rob Hardy" (Columbus, Mississippi USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Ballad of the Whiskey Robber: A True Story of Bank Heists, Ice Hockey, Transylvanian Pelt Smuggling, Moonlighting Detectives, and Broken Hearts (Hardcover)

Hungary's most beloved criminal, Attila Ambrus, is locked away until 2016, but even now he is interviewed on television, as a commentator on current bank robberies since he was an expert, and even the dog he had when he was free (and who will probably never see him again) makes the news now and then. Attila won't say what his immediate plans are; he says he'd "be insincere" if he made remarks about planning to escape, but he is working on getting an education, and he loves reading. He has a huge encyclopedia of Hungarian history that even mentions him as a national folk hero. This is despite his alcoholism, addiction to gambling, womanizing, and career as the worst goalie ever in professional Hungarian hockey. The bizarre story is rollickingly told in _Ballad of the Whiskey Robber: A True Story of Bank Heists, Ice Hockey, Transylvanian Pelt Smuggling, Moonlighting Detectives, and Broken Hearts_ (Little, Brown) by Julian Rubinstein. This hugely entertaining story would fail if it were fiction; Rubinstein has done lots of research, including hours of jailhouse interviews with the hero, and it is all true, but still incredible.

Attila escaped from Romania to Hungary in 1988, clinging to the bottom of a train. He wound up in Budapest penniless and friendless, and he had a funny accent. With unswerving determination, he caught on to a championship Budapest hockey club. Once he did get a chance to show his stuff on the ice, "... it didn't take long for the team to recognize the new kid's level of talent. Zero...." He didn't get paid, but he doubled as the team's janitor. He also drove the Zamboni, until while driving drunk one night, he drove it into the stands. Desperate for some better life, and for a better place to live than the stable he had found, he got drunk, put on a wig and some mascara, and knocked off a post office. It was easy. He went on to accomplish almost thirty drunken robberies over six years, always unfailingly polite to the tellers, even bringing them roses. Capture, of course, was sooner or later inevitable, as long as Attila kept playing the robbery game, and he was eventually arrested in 1999 and put into the escape-proof downtown jail. He became a television start; in interviews, he was poised, amused, and amusing, and Whiskey Robber television specials, biographies, and t-shirts all sold well. (Some of the t-shirts toted up his score of banks: "Whiskey Robber 28, Corrupt Cops 1".) His case became, as Rubinstein writes, a referendum on the government.

It only became more so when Attila broke from prison (by means of an escape rope made of shredded sheets and shoe laces) and started robbing again, increasing the power of his legend. People refused to turn him in. Even _Sports Illustrated_ got into the act, erroneously celebrating him as "one of the best goalies in his country's top pro league." Of course he got caught again, and has stayed in prison so far. Robbing banks is surely wrong, as is boozing at Attila's level, as is losing all gains to roulette, and Rubinstein never makes the mistake of idealizing the hero of his book, no matter what degree the Hungarians have. He is a troubled and unhappy man, and a talented and ingratiating one, who was puzzled and delighted by his own fame as he made headlines in the crime pages as well as the sports pages. Attila ought to be overjoyed by this hilarious, larger-than-life book portrait, but Rubinstein has also drawn a picture of a society that was battered by communism only to be let down by the capitalist bosses who took over. The hilarious tale is thus a sad one, too, for all its absurdity; hero criminals are only needed by the downtrodden.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Even with my anticipation it did not disappoint!, March 29, 2005

By 

Nathan Zaugg (Farmington, Utah, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Ballad of the Whiskey Robber: A True Story of Bank Heists, Ice Hockey, Transylvanian Pelt Smuggling, Moonlighting Detectives, and Broken Hearts (Hardcover)

I had been waiting to hear the full story surrounding the Whisky Robber since I heard a bit about him in the summer of 1997 while I was living in Hungary. I followed his crime spree, arrest, escape, and recapture even after returning home, since I found something compelling in this brazen thief. When I heard about this book, I had to have it. It definitely did not disappoint.

Not only does Rubinstein write a compelling story in its "True Crime" aspects, he also paints an accurate picture of Hungary during the time of the crime spree. His book helped take me back to my time in Hungary from 1995-1997 and some of the absurdities that existed during that time and afterward.

However, the story of Atilla Ambrus was even more compelling. Once I picked it up, I could not put it down. Now that I have read it, I can't stop telling everybody around me about it.